Why I'm Here
by staceycj
Summary: Sam teeters on the brink....which road will he take...when both seem to lead him to his own version of hell...
1. Chapter 1

AN: This was inspired by a Sam fan. So forgive this girl, who tends to write for Dean, this may sound jumbled, but I thought I would give this a shot. It will be short, like three or four chapters short. Enjoy.

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Following Sam, getting to Ruby, and killing Ruby had been easy, fun even. It was like getting back to the familiar, getting back to what he believed in, killing those evil sons of bitches, and protecting his little brother. However, the look in Sam's eyes, the wild look, the feral look, like a man possessed, like an addict who was without a fix, blood smeared down his chin, pupils dilated so badly that it looked as if his eyes were becoming demonic, and he was coming after him, lock stock and barrel--that had been difficult. Shooting his little brother with a dart gun full of sedative, had been difficult, hauling him to the car and strapping him down to a bed inside the panic room had been majorly difficult. But nothing had prepared him for when Sam woke up, and was chained, iron chains, to the bed, and he started snarling. Literally snarling like a wild animal.

"Let me out Dean!" he screamed.

"No Sammy. I can't." he said from the other side of the room. He couldn't sit next to the bed, couldn't be up close and personal as his brother went through this hell, a hell that was all his fault, and that Sammy should never have been subjected to.

"Because you are too weak? Is that it? You so weak you want me weak too."

"Sammy. Not like this."

"Stop. Calling. Me. Sammy!" Dean said nothing, just watched as Sam bucked and strained against the restraints, screamed and demanded that he do something, that he release him, let him do the job that Dean wasn't man enough to do. He tried everything, he taunted, he pressed every button he knew Dean had, and Dean didn't budge, he simply stood there, rock salt gun in one hand, and the demon killing knife in the other. Bobby came in from time to time and offered Dean water, and Dean refused it unless Sam took a drink, and in his addled demon blood induced haze, Sam refused, refused so Dean would refuse, and Sam could make his brother suffer in the same way he was.

Sam's screaming rants finally died down after hours, his voice gave out along side his body and the rants turned into mumbles of an exhausted man, and were encapsulated in a fitful sleep. Dean slid down the wall and rested his head on his knees. This was worse than he ever imagined. How had they ended up this way? How had everything gone so wrong? Oh that's right. He screwed up. He failed his brother, and his father—that was the reason for this mess. The eldest Winchester felt a hand on his shoulder and tired green eyes looked up and found Bobby's soft ones.

"Son, you need sleep."

"No. I can't sleep while he's like this Bobby."

"Dean. He's asleep. You need rest if you're gonna keep vigil over his bed like this."

"I don't want to leave him."

"I'll stand guard."

"Can I sleep here?"

"I'll go get you a blanket."

"Will you wake me if anything happens?"

"Of course." Dean nodded and Bobby left and returned with a blanket and a pillow. "Sleep." Dean nodded and settled in.

Once both of her boys were resting, she decided it was time for her to come, time for her to take Sam, and show him what was really going on, what Sam really meant in the world, what he meant to others, and why he had been allowed to continue his existence.

She reached down with one ethereal hand and locked onto Sam's soul and pulled it out. Sam stood there blinking rapidly and looking around, to his body on the bed, looking worn out and drawn. The glance at his body made his stomach turned, he looked like an addict, looked no better than the people who lived in squallar and were on the news, dead of an overdose with a needle sticking out of a vein. When had he become this? He didn't' remember becoming that.

Sam turned to the person responsible for this most current out of body experience and aw his mother. She was beautiful, long blonde curls, striking blue eyes, soft smile. She was the reason for everything. She was the reason he had demon blood, she was the reason their father became obsessed, the reason Dean looked lost when he thought no one was looking. She was the matriarch, she was their reason for being, and she was standing in front of him, for the first time not wearing that fateful nightgown, and she was smiling, at him. "Mom?" he asked astonished

"Sammy." She smiled softly and reached out a hand and pushed hair off of his face.

"You came to get me?"

"Get you?" she asked.

"I'm dead? Going to heaven? I actually get to go to heaven?" He said with a hopefulness that he hadn't felt in years.

"No baby. It isn't your time yet."

"But…" He gestured to his battle weary body.

"It's not your time." She repeated.

"Then why are you here?"

"You need me."

"I've needed you for years. My whole life. Why chose now to come? I needed you when I was a kid. Hell Dean needed you, Dad needed you. Why didn't you come to us then? Why couldn't you do something? Why?" He was angry, so suddenly so that it scared him, just moments ago he was basking in her glory and now he was so infuriated, infuriated like he used to get with Dad.

"God works in mysterious ways."

"That's bull mom. That's bull. The angels keep telling Dean that crap and then they make him torture someone, they make him do what will break him. So don't give me that."

"Well he does. And that is the truth of the matter. We are not meant to understand everything. Think about it Sammy, if God didn't allow things you wouldn't still be here baby."

"No. God had nothing to do with it. That's what happens when your dumb ass brother trades his soul for you."

"He loves you."

"He was being selfish."

"He loves you Sam."

"How can he? Really Mom? How can Dean love me?"

"What kind of question is that baby?"

"A good one. Look at what I've done to him." Mary looked over at her eldest boy, who was huddled on the floor, uncomfortable and beginning to dream of hell. His body was twitching and showing the signs of nightmares. "Look at him Mom. If it wasn't for him selling his soul, for him sacrificing everything, just so I can live, just so he wouldn't be alone, he would be fine. He wouldn't be so damaged. He would be sane." Mary sighed and gave her son a smile. "I wouldn't have forced him to start the apocalypse." Sam said the last wistfully.

"You don't understand your brother do you?"

"I know Dean better than anyone in the world."

"But you still think he just did it because he can't be alone?"

"Yeah. Dean doesn't do well alone."

"No. Let me show you something baby. Let me show you."


	2. Possible Reaction

Sam blinked and found himself at Bobby's house. Disorientation passed quickly and he looked around, hunter's senses kicking in and telling him that there were other people around. "What are we doing here?"

"Just watch baby."

"I thought this was about Dean. Not Bobby."

"It is about your brother." Sam gave her a confused set of hazel eyes. "I don't understand mom."

"Where would your brother have gone after you died back in Cold Oak?"

Realization danced across his features. "He would have gone to Bobby's."

"Yes. Now watch." Sam waited. No sounds other than the normal rustle outside of Bobby's windows, no sights that were unfamiliar. What could this possibly show him about his brother? That he accepted people for who they were and didn't care how they lived as long as they were nice decent people? Well, that is a dumb lesson if he ever heard of one. He knew that about his brother, that was easy, that was just an inherent part of his brother. Why would his mother come all the way here, to show him that?

He was turning to speak to her when he heard the screen door creak. Moving forward, almost on instinct, he hurried to the door. A curly haired man entered with Bobby. His face was down, and he was leaving a blood trail as he walked. Bobby was doing what he could to hold the man up. The man appeared to be injured.

"Come on son, only a little farther." Bobby said as he drug the man to the couch. "There we go." He laid the curly haired man on the couch.

Curls of hair and beard masked the man's features. Blood marred the rest of him, and Bobby pulled the man's ragged worn boots off of his feet, and pulled the stinking socks from his feet.

"Boy, you have to take better care of yourself. This isn't what they would have wanted for you."

"Doesn't matter." He slurred. The haggard man seemed to be drunk. Was he a hunter? And if he was, it most certainly wasn't a good idea to try to take anything out when you're drunk.

"It does matter. I don't want you dead."

"I'm already dead. They're gone. There's nothing left to live for. I failed. I failed. Bobby. I screwed up, and here I am. Alone, and I can't die. And this apocalypse is going to happen and I can't stop it. I'm not strong enough without them. Not good enough without them." The man curled up on his side, facing away from Bobby and his unknown audience. His shirt crept up on him and Sam's eyes widened. The scar. The scar that was a scar because it had been Sam's first time with the thread and needle. Dean had been hurt pretty bad and Dad had left Sam with Dean to get him patched up, Dean didn't complain the entire time Sam stitched him up. Not through the jabbing, the hesitant pokes and failed attempts. He just kept encouraging, kept telling him that he was all right, that he was doing a good job and not to worry, and that of course it didn't hurt because Sam had the magic touch. Sam blinked rapidly, shifted from foot to foot, swallowed hard.

"Dean." Sam said through gritted teeth.

"Yes, baby that's your brother."

"But…his hair is curly." It was lame. He knew it was. But there were so much wrong, so many things different. It was hard to pin point just one thing that made his brother so completely different. It was easier to pick something obvious, because the rest was just too hard to fathom.

"Why do you think he's kept his hair so short?" Mary said gently.

"Dean. You have to let me get you cleaned up."

"Leave me alone."

"Dean, you've got a nasty cut on your face."

"What does it matter?"

"It'll get infected."

"I don't care. Just leave me alone Bobby. Just leave me here to die."

"Dean,"

"Leave me alone Bobby."

"Son, you have to keep going. For them." Sam's shifted from foot to foot.

"Freaking Bobby uses that line on him too!" Sam spun from the scene to his mother. "See, Mom, it has nothing to do with love. It's about duty, about responsibility. It has nothing to do with the fact that he loves me so much, he just can't be alone." Sam crossed his arms over his chest. "And just telling him stuff like that…"

"Motivates him."

"What?"

"Motivates him. Dean will do anything if it's for you."

"That's the problem! God! His whole life. That's all he does. Whatever is good for Sammy! He'll freaking die for me, go to hell for me, it's all good. Just as long as Sammy gets what he needs or wants because that is what Dean is supposed to do. That is Dean's job. Dean's life goal is to take care of Sammy! Do you even think he knows why? Do you really think you can love a responsibility? Who would want to!?"

"I love you and your brother and you both were my responsibilities."

"That's different Mom. You're my mother."

"And Dean looks at you like his son."

That statement stopped Sam in his tracks. "What?"

"Oh Sam. You had to have known baby."

"Known that he looks at me like his son?"

"Yes. That's why what you are going through right now scares him so much. He looks at you like he needs to protect you, like he needs to keep you safe. That isn't how normal brothers function Sam. Your time at Stanford should have taught you that. You should have seen just how other people work, learned that not all brothers and sisters would die for one another, that while they love each other deeply, that their lives do not revolve around the other. You, Sam, are different for Dean. You are his child. He raised you to be the man you are. And with this whole demon blood drinking thing, he thinks he's failed. He thinks he has failed as a father."

Sam felt his blood boil. His fists clenched and he did everything in his power not to look at the man on the couch, dripping blood, crouched in the fetal position, trying to make himself look small, invisible. That wasn't the man that his brother was, not this broken, homeless looking man that was before him. That wasn't Dean. "It's all dad's fault." He said low in his throat.

"What?"

"Dad is the one who made him raise me, made him grow up, become this…this thing without me. He shouldn't be like this. He should have his own life, he shouldn't have made the deal, shouldn't have to be reduced to this." He gestured towards the Dean on the couch. "Dad did this to him."

Mary looked at her son. The son she hadn't been able to raise, nurture or care for, and she reached up and touched his strong features. "Baby. Your brother bonded with you long before your dad made him run out of the house with you in his arms."

"But we would have been normal brothers. We wouldn't have depended on the other so fiercely. I could have died and he wouldn't have been destroyed. He would have been able to live."

"Sam. Sweetheart. For all of your protestations of knowing your brother, you sure are clueless. He's loved you from the moment of conception, with a ferocity that even the angels can see. Why do you think that they haven't turned you to dust baby? They could have. They could have with a simple thought. Because you have been doing some very questionable things, and your loyalties aren't clear."

"My loyalties are with Dean." he said definitively.

"But you still go behind his back and drink Ruby's blood."

"It's to help Dean."

"I know you believe that. But the angels don't. Why do you think they haven't turned you to dust?" Sam shrugged.

"Maybe it's because they think I'm useful."

Mary smiled. "Sweetheart. They think you are dangerous and to be treated like any random demon on the street." Sam stood up, defiance in his posture and arrogance in his eyes, his classic defense.

"Then why haven't they done it? It's not like I could hide from them."

"Because that would destroy your brother. Because he loves you so much, he can't even take the idea of losing you. Because if Cass smites you tomorrow, Dean wouldn't do anything, he'd kill himself Sammy, he would. And the angels know that the two of you are a pair, that you two are stronger together. That together you can take on this apocalypse and kick it back to hell. They know that. You should know that. You shouldn't be fighting against your brother."

"But, I have to help him. Be stronger. Protect him."

Dean, sleeping lighter than he ever had in his entire life, heard his brother's breathing speed up and he awoke, and hurried over to the brother bound on the table. "Sammy. Shhhhh." He whispered and pushed hair off of his baby brother's face. "I'm here Sammy. I'm here. You'll be okay. I gotcha."


	3. Other Dean

"But Mom." Sam said and turned to his mother, unable to watch his brother tend to his broken, demon blood addicted body, any longer. "Mom. He has only ended up like that because of me. Because of my death, because Dad forced him to be a hunter, because Yellow Eyes killed you."

"So you believe that if you hadn't even been born that your brother would be better off?" Sam stopped, realized that was what he had just described and he nodded. "Yes. Most definitely. He could be happy right now, married, and children, Mom he's so good with kids, and he could be someone."

"So you don't think your brother is anyone?"

"No, Yes," Sam sighed, confusion seemed to be his unhappy partner these days. He couldn't remember the last time he made a decision and it seemed to be the absolute clear and right answer. It had to be way before Dean went to hell and that was saying something. Once upon a time, he prided himself on his rational and clear mind, and these days his mind was anything but clear.

"I don't' know. I just know that if it hadn't been for me, everyone would be so much happier. You would be alive, Dean would never have ended up in Hell, Dad would be fine, and….and the damn apocalypse wouldn't be happening right now. Dean wouldn't have been forced to start it, wouldn't' have been tor-" his voice hitched "tortured into starting it." Mary's eyes went soft with concern. She reached out to the son she had never known and brushed hair out of his eyes.

"Your brother….your brother needs you." Sam gave her disbelieving eyes and she sighed. "Let me show you one more thing. That will prove to you, that your brother was born to be your brother."

The scene changed to a warm and bright house, but no sooner had he got his bearings did he hear screaming.

"You have to get yourself together Dean!" Yelled what sounded like his mother.

"You need to leave me the hell alone!" Sam slowly walked towards the sound, and the scene came into view. And shock ran through his system

"You can't be out all night partying. You have a son to take care of."

"God Mom. It's not like I asked her to get pregnant." Dean rolled his eyes. Sam's mouth fell agape. Dean never would shirk the responsibility of a child. Sam remembered just how much his brother wanted Ben to be his son. Sam knew without a doubt, that if he had found out that Ben was his, he would have done his best by him.

Dean turned around and the sight of his brother completely horrified Sam. His hair was longer, and his face was roughly the same, but there was a hard look in his green eyes, a hardness that no amount of hunting had ever put in them. It made Sam take a step back. The doubly pierced lip, and tattoo running up his neck, and the violent looking scenes depicted on his arms, added to Sam's horror and astonishment. It took effort on Sam's part to get Dean to get the protection tattoo on his chest, and he still wasn't happy about it. Sam caught him once or twice looking at it in the mirror and shaking his head while dressing. This man before him couldn't be his brother.

"No. This isn't Dean. This is a trick. A joke. This isn't what Dean would be like if I wasn't here. This isn't the man I grew up with," he said in complete horror.

"Just watch."

"Dean, you just got out of jail. You are on probation. You have to keep your nose clean."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Whatever mom."

"Dean. I can't take it again. I can't take seeing my baby locked up in prison."

"It's not like I killed anyone mom. Don't be so dramatic."

"You broke into someone's house, with a gun, with a gun baby, and you took their things."

"Those yuppie freaks had it coming to them," he said with a smirk.

Horror and disbelief grew in Sam's belly and he couldn't take it anymore, couldn't watch this argument, couldn't see the man that was pretending to be Dean Winchester, he had to get out. "Get me out of here. This isn't my brother." Sam demanded. Mary nodded and they were back in the panic room, watching Dean, Sam's Dean, coddle his withdrawing body and murmuring comforts to him. Sam's chest eased when he watched the scene, saw the fear and worry on his brother's face. Sam turned with tear filled eyes to his mother.

"He would have ended up like that, without me?"

"Yes. Your brother had to learn early how to worry about other people, because of you. He learned that lesson, and it has made him into the man before you. So, if you take yourself out of the equation your brother doesn't become this man, doesn't become the loving, caring, selfless man before you. Each life in this world Sammy, affects the lives of many. Your life has affected a great many people's both in positive and negative ways. And you have to remember, that in every way that truly matters, you helped to shape your brother into the man he is, and that apocalypse or no apocalypse he loves you." Sam nodded, hearing his mother, but not watching her. He was too busy watching his brother. He closed his eyes for just a second, and when he opened them again, he was looking up at Dean.

"There you are kiddo." He said softly. "I was starting to worry you weren't gonna come back to the land of the living." Sam swallowed thickly. "Thirsty?" Sam nodded, and he lost the reassuring presence of his brother for a moment, and just as panic was about to set in Dean pressed a cup to his lips and murmured, "I got ya. You'll be okay. I promise Sammy. You'll be okay." And for the first time since his brother told him of the deal, Sam believed in the reassurance.


End file.
